Three Thanksgivings & 26 Week Update

I have held this lifelong love-hate relationship with Thanksgiving - I love the time with family and friends, but I hate the food.  Seriously.  Turkey, dressing, cranberry sauce, anything pumpkin-flavored - it just gives me the culinary willies.  Growing up, my mother would serve me hot fruit and a baked potato at every Thanksgiving meal, not because other dishes weren't offered to me, it was the only food I would eat.  However, people love that traditional food, and I am perfectly happy not being the person responsible for cooking it all.  This year, I had the rare opportunity to eat not just one meal, but THREE Thanksgiving meals:

Thanksgiving meal #1: Preston Class Progressive Dinner

Our first dinner was a progressive dinner with our friends from our Sunday School class.  The evening started off with drinks and appetizers at Natalie's house where we stayed for about an hour catching up in her kitchen.  Hello Captain Rodney's cheese bake:

Then we moved on to Daniel and Whitney's house for the main part of the meal.  Whitney worked really hard on the delicious turkey and side dishes, which some of us also brought.  I was introduced to Jennifer's green beans wrapped in bacon, baked in butter.  Have I mentioned I love living in the South?

From there, we headed to Randy and Mary's house for dessert.  Mary had chocolate martinis for everyone (sadly, I could not partake) and several other desserts including my favorite - s'more cookies.  Two are my limit, so of course I had three:

Thanksgiving meal #2: Wine Club

Our wine club was formed from our Junior League small group, and it has grown over the past 12+ months to include many ladies who are not in the JLM.  Sam (who is due a few weeks after me) hosted the dinner, and her sweet husband cooked most of the food:

Thanksgiving meal #3: JD's parents' house (Hattiesburg, MS)

We started a new tradition last year of spending Thanksgiving with the Graffams.  Mary (JD's mother) took over most of the cooking this year as we could not drive down until Thanksgiving day.  She put a lot of work into the food prep, and I know that JD's dad was very hungry waiting on us to arrive!  This year, my mother joined us in Hattiesburg as my sister and her family booked a fun cruise for the holiday.  We enjoyed a nice meal, and spent the rest of the weekend shopping and relaxing.  No pictures of course.  In fact, the first meal's photos I ripped from the Internet, and someone else in the wine club posted pictures on Facebook or I wouldn't have had those either.  I am the worst at taking photos.  My sister is concerned that Baby Graffam won't have any pictures as it grows up.  Speaking of babies...


26 Week Update

Several of you have asked, so here is a rare baby bump photo taken by JD (who would take pictures everyday if I let him):

BABY STATS

How far along: 26 weeks.

How big is baby: As big as an eggplant, weighing around two pounds.

Total weight gain:  Nada.  Zilch.  I still weigh less than right before I got pregnant.  But, the baby is growing and that is all the doc cares about.  And I am happy because I am still allowed to run.

Maternity clothes: I switched to maternity pants around 25 weeks.  My regular pants weren't too tight, but they just fit...weird.  Maternity pants were just so much more comfortable.  Once you open the maternity clothing floodgates, it is hard to stop.  I now wear maternity tops though my regular tops would work as well.

Sleep: I am doing really well in this department most nights.  It was the first trimester that was the worst with the back aches.  I've learned to sleep with a pillow under my stomach for support and, so long as Buddy doesn't knock me off of said pillow in the middle of the night, I sleep pretty heavily.

Best moment of the week: I read somewhere that the baby was developed enough so that you could hear its heartbeat if JD pressed his ear to my stomach.  So he tried, and what happened?  The baby kicked him in the face.  I'd say we are going to have our hands full in March.

Food cravings:  None that I can recall.

Food aversions:  Anything and everything in the first trimester.  No meat, only fruit and salad.  I think I lost 12 pounds from that alone as morning sickness was never an issue.  My food aversions have mostly abated by now, and I am back to eating my regular food as we approach the third trimester (next week!).

Symptoms:  Um, being pregnant?  Don't really know how to answer this.  Crazy sinus issues and sensitivity to smell.  But then again, JD says my sense of smell is super-human and should be studied by science.

Movements: Practically all day, every day I feel little kicks.  We were eating dinner the other night in the den, and I had the plate on my lap.  I was holding the plate, and started to feel it rock back and forth.  That's when I realized the baby was moving/kicking the plate.  Guess I had it too close to the belly;)

Gender:  Much to our families' and friends' disappointment, we decided not to find out the gender.  What a neat surprise at delivery!  Most of the old wives' tales predict boy, but who really knows?

What I am looking forward to: Holding the baby. Naming the baby.  Starting this new chapter in our lives as a family, and learning how JD and I bond as a couple in this new dynamic.

What I miss:  Having a drink.  I never thought about missing alcohol as I would often not have a drink for weeks, but there is something about having a nice glass of wine during the holidays I am missing right now.

Next appointment: November 30th.  It's the dreaded gestational diabetes test too.  I pray I don't have it.  JD  had ACL surgery today, so tomorrow will be the first OB appointment he will miss.  I will miss having him there, but will be sure to take good notes to fill him in on everything when I get back to the house.  If he isn't too medicated to talk...

A Different Take on Marriage

As I drive to work each morning, this particular billboard in East Memphis always captures my attention:

The message intended here is - if you love your wife, you will buy her the nicest jewelry from this particular diamond broker.  I have certainly benefited from JD's generosity over the years and own several pieces of nice jewelry.  But, for those of us who have been married longer than ten minutes, we can tell you what love looks like.  Love doesn't come in a small extravagant box, in a larger than necessary house, or in a fancy vehicle.  This is what real love looks like:

I don't know who this guy is, but you get the point.  Real love is lending a hand around the house without being asked, wanting to help out.  It's being on your hands and knees scrubbing the bathroom floor after flying in from a long business trip because you don't want your pregnant wife to hurt her back.  It's setting up a weekly Wednesday appointment on your busy calendar to remind yourself to go home to let the dog outside and feed him, because I will be at school all day and you know that I worry about the dog.

Real love is sending your mother-in-law flowers because she is having a tough day, without me even knowing about it.  It's spending an exorbitant amount of time discussing the differences between coral and salmon pink, all without rolling your eyes.  Shiny trinkets can be lost, homes can burn to the ground, and fancy cars can stop working.  But, having a love that is mutually respectful is what keeps a marriage on a strong foundation so that when we face insurmountable situations, we turn to each other for support and not other people.

Thankful Thursday: Husband Edition

I am generally pretty thankful for all that JD does for me, but he really went above and beyond this week.  Let me explain.  Tuesday night, I had a to-do list a mile long to complete.  We are heading to Atlanta on Friday to celebrate my niece's 4th birthday, and because of class/social events, Tuesday was the only evening for me to get everything done.

JD was in Virginia on a business trip, and we had already talked on the phone for quite a while catching up and making final selections for nursery bedding (check and check).  He's an hour ahead with an early flight in the morning, so we said good night early and I got back to my list.  The election returns are playing in the background as I am wrapping Emma's presents, running the laundry and waiting for my home wax kit to heat up.  I like to wax my own eyebrows at home instead of doing it at the salon to save money and because it is much more convenient.  Five speedy minutes later, I decide the eyebrows are sufficiently waxed, looking good, and I unplug the wax kit to set on the back of the commode so it can cool down before I put it away.  I remember looking at my watch and thinking, "wow, it's only 8:45, I bet I can get to bed early tonight."  As I look up, I see the wax kit is tipping over, pouring wax ALL OVER the commode.  In my blind panic, I snatch up the kit and walk quickly to the bathroom vanity to set it down.  Meanwhile, I have spilled wax from one side of the bathroom to the other.

With fingers covered in wax and sticky bare feet, I use my knuckle to dial JD (thank you, iPhone for being so easy to use).  Poor guy was sound asleep and completely lost as to why I was in panic mode.  Professional wax is not like candle wax - which dries hard and can be scraped off.  Professional wax STAYS sticky.  I am so upset at this point because I can't move out of the bathroom due to the wax on my hands and feet, and I have LITERALLY no idea how to rectify the situation.  I am yelling into the iPhone which is on speaker because I can't hold it with my waxy hands, and our poor dog has taken cover in the front of the house because I scared him.  After assuring JD a hundred times that I am not hurt, just sticky, he starts searching on how to clean this up.  He then utters something I have never experienced before, "Google did not return any search results" on how to clean up professional wax.  He changed his search criteria and found some people had success with vegetable oil, so I brave the sticky floor conundrum and trek to the kitchen to grab the bottle of vegetable oil.

Note here that I only use canola oil, but JD surprised me by making a birthday cake for me a month ago in which he purchased the largest bottle of vegetable oil ever made.  We wouldn't have the vegetable oil if it weren't for his birthday surprise, a fact that is not lost on me.  After a few hours, I have successfully removed 10% of the wax spill - from my hands, feet, part of the floor and counter.  I am extremely tired and sure that my blood pressure is way too high from this incident, JD tells me to close the door to the bathroom and use the guest bathroom tomorrow.  Poor guy is volunteering to scrub the rest of the bathroom when he gets back from his long business trip with little sleep thanks to his accident-prone wife.  Sure enough, when I get home from class on Wednesday night around nine p.m., he is in full-scrub mode.  He asked me if I flung the wax around the bathroom in helicopter mode based on the patterns in the floor, walls, etc.  I think I was panicking so much I have no idea what really happened.  After three vigorous hours of wax removal, our bathroom is cleaner than it has ever been thanks to my wonderful husband.  And we no longer own an at-home wax kit.

Pittsburgh Fun Friend Trip

This summer, one of my dearest friends from childhood, Jennifer, and her husband Anthony packed up their belongings and moved from Memphis to Pittsburgh for an amazing job opportunity for Anthony.  While their friends and family were happy for their good fortune, we still miss them terribly! Jennifer is a native Memphian and I am just waiting for a serious cold snap to send her back here:)  In the meantime, I flew up to PA last weekend to catch up with my old friends.

First off, it was 40 degrees in Memphis when I flew out - how cold was it in Pittsburgh you ask?  A balmy 70 degrees.  So far, not looking good for my fair-weather friends to head back South.  But, I digress.  Anthony picked me up from the airport, and we hung out until Jennifer got home from work.  I have always enjoyed spending time with Anthony - I like to pick his brain over medical conditions and the research he is developing.  We both share a love of research (and Law & Order SVU), and I even attempted to get him to work with me on a Health Econ project, but I couldn't get my hands on the data before they moved.  Jenn came home from work and we headed to La Cappella in their Fox Chapel neighborhood (Anthony and I always vote for pizza when given a choice).  The pizza was awesome.  Hanging out with them on a Friday night was just like old times (sans JD).  After dinner, we headed back to their house so Jenn and I could catch up on our girl talk.

Here's the part that is always funny - we have very similar tastes in clothing and decor.  Even if we wouldn't pick it out for ourselves, we can usually figure out what the other would pick.  Jenn came downstairs wearing the same pajama pants I have, and then proceeded to help me pick out nursery bedding that looked just like something I would have picked out (of course).  We hit up the outlet mall the next day where we ended up picking up similar sweaters and purses.  Afterwards, we cruised through IKEA to pick up a bookcase for their guest room.  Jenn knows how much I like a good project, so I convinced her putting together this bookcase would be a snap.  It was, and it looks great!

That night, we ate at the Walnut Grill restaurant near their house.  The temperature had drastically dropped, and the rain from Hurricane Sandy began to move in.  I managed to stay warm with a little apple cobbler:)  On Sunday, I was ready to experience the touristy Pittsburgh.  Jenn took me to the Andy Warhol museum.  I've always enjoyed Warhol's style, and saw a traveling exhibit of his at MoMA a few years ago in NYC.  Warhol is a native of Pittsburgh and a graduate of Carnegie Mellon, so I knew this museum in his hometown would not disappoint.

Jenn and I perused six floors of exhibits, then headed to the Strip District to check out the local wares of Pittsburgh's native retailers.  It's basically this one-half square mile area near downtown that features local vendors with amazing produce, beautiful flowers, any kind of meat you desire.  Retailers also line the Strip, selling Steelers paraphernalia and other higher-end handmade items.

Jenn assured me that no trip to Pittsburgh was complete without a trip to the Primanti Brothers for a true Pittsburgh sandwich.  Apparently, this local favorite features sourdough bread, coleslaw with vinegar and fries served on the sandwich with any kind of meat/cheese you select.  Here's my roast beef selection:

I can say the meal was fun, and tasted interesting.  Definitely worth the experience!  Sadly, my weekend was coming to an end, and Jenn dropped me at the airport.  Hurricane Sandy was moving in, and most of the flights after mine were cancelled.  Luckily, they let my flight through, and I headed to Atlanta...to wait for three hours before heading to Memphis. Sounds boring, right?  Not when your sister, her husband and your niece make the trek to entertain you!

While I wasn't able to treat them to a nicer meal for making the trip (Atlanta Bread anyone?), they were good sports about the cafeteria food and I enjoyed seeing them.  Emma decided to explore my suitcase during dinner, so she looked like a cross between her Aunt Katie and a disturbing bag lady:

I'm always thankful to have such wonderful siblings who love each other and genuinely enjoy spending time together.  I hope that, one day, JD and I will be able to have a large family with children who enjoy hanging out together like Megan, Kevin and I do.  Even though Kev is in Afghanistan, he sends witty emails and likes to participate in our group banter often.  Emma's fourth birthday party is in a few days, and I know we will all have a good time together!  In the meantime, here is some major cheesiness from me and Emma: